The weekly activities add interest and variety and are a great source of ideas for home. They are enjoyed by children and parents together.
Here are some ideas to use when it's your turn to organise the weekly activity. Be sure to try it at home with your child first and, if needed, include a little instruction sheet. Also, try to identify how your weekly activity is trying to build your child's skill set (practical life, sensorial, language, mathematics, or cultural studies). Please share other ideas with your session and add the really good ones to the back of the white 'Activity Ideas' file (a sample and instructions would be great).
Send a Postcard
Bring a few postcoards. Stamps if you're feeling generous. Set our textas or colour pencils. Instruct child to draw or write on the left side of the postcard. Address to another child in the playgroup. Bring home and send off.
Make Finger Puppets
Cut the fingers from rubber gloves. Use paper bags, socks, pantyhose or toilet rolls and decorate with wool, buttons, stickers, glitter, textas etc.
Make a Hat
Cut strips of card long enough to fit around child's head. Use feathers to decorate. Or use bits of pipe cleaners to make a spider hat with stickers for eyes. Or a crown. Or a silly hat. Secure with staples.
Make a Place Mat
Cut out lots of pictures of food. Get children to stick their favourite ones on a piece of coloured paper that can be laminated (at home). Or have a smorgasbord of cut pictures laid out and children paste their favourite ones onto a paper plate.
Sand Painting
Get different coloured sands and soils. Apply paste to paper and use teaspoon to apply sand to paste. Shake off excess (outside?).
Finger Painting
Mix ½ cup of corn flour, a cup of cold water and add some paint. Do dribbles, or finger painting.
Squashy Painting
Fold a piece of paper in half then open. Spoon paint onto half of it then fold gently and squash before re-opening.
Slime
Mix two bags of corn flour with a small amount of water and food colouring or edicol dye in the red trough (in large storeroom) to make a lovely slimy mixture.
Potato Prints
Cut out shapes from potatoes, dip into paint and print on white or coloured paper or use the ready-made, no-mess sponges with handles (in the printing section of our art storeroom). The paint can then be sprinkled with glitter or confetti
Make Cards
For special occasions, use the A4 coloured card (in the art storeroom). Fold in ½ and decorate appropriately
Make Shakers
Fill plastic bottles with rice and beans. Seal. Decorate with stick on shapes or coloured contact paper.
Paper Bag Kite
Attach a piece of string (reinforce the holes on the bag) and paste or staple crepe paper streamers at the bottom then run with your kite.
Make a Tail
Stuff screwed up newspapers (or old supermarket bags) into knee high stockings/socks. Add dots and stripes with a texta or go plain. Use a peg to attach to clothes.
Paper Plate Animal/Shaker
Fold a small plate in half, staple a jumbo popstick to the bottom then staple the edges closed almost to the top. Funnel in some rice (or maybe pasta if you don't want it escaping everywhere). Close off remaining hole. Make a bird by adding feathers, moving eyes and 1/6 size pieces of colour patty pans (for beak). Make a mouse or porcupine by keeping horizontal and adding pipecleaners, popsticks or matchstickes. Create your own animal and shake!
Make Table Napkins or Dye Paintings
Use paper towel pieces or serviettes of reasonable thickness. Fold them corner to corner a couple of times then dunk corners into containers of edicol dyes (medium strength). Open up and show to child. Fold up again for clearer colours and leave to dry or store open one on top of another for speckling and bleeding of colours. Take home in a plastic bag. Wear aprons for this activity and it needs close supervision.
Nature Art
Make things out of natural objects. A boat from bark, a leaf or a stick. A caterpillar from cotton-wool balls and moving eyes stuck onto an Autumn leaf. A mobile from autumn leaves attached to a string. Colour bark with paint or chalk.
Make a Butterfly
Thread tissue paper or cellophane into a dolly peg. Add dots or moving eyes and pipecleaners
Squeeze Oranges
Bring a super-duper orange press or use the 3 squeezers in the storeroom. All you need is oranges!
Fruit Kebab
Precut delicious fruit into small chunks. Children then thread theirs onto a skewer ready for morning tea.
Mini Toast Delights
Use mini toasts (or rice crackers, or bread). Spread on cream cheese and add cut apricots, sultanas or fruit medley. Make a face or traffic lights using food.
Boiled Egg Activity
Children peel hard-boiled eggs and slice them using the slicers kept in the large storeroom (with juicers).
Make a Sandwich
Supply all necessary ingredients for children to make their own sandwiches for morning tea (or to eat straight away!)
Flower Arranging
Bring in flowers and foliage. Arrange on a lace doily. Roll up and secure with a pipecleaner then spray with water. You could also bring in some oasis and let the children arrange the flowers in it.
Wrapping a Parcel
Use old gift paper to wrap boxes. Please replace those you use if you take them from our art store.
Preparing and Posting a Letter
Provide paper to draw on, envelopes and 5 cent stamps (or make your own stamps from sticky labels). Mail in our special post box which is on the top shelf in the large storeroom.
Plant Seedlings
Plant seedlings in our garden patch or a planter box by the cubby house. Prepare the earth the week before and remind all sessions to water them.
Blowing Bubbles
Everything is provided - blowers, mixture, antiseptic wash. Find it on the shelf in the large storeroom. This is definitely best done outside.
For other ideas look in our ABC Useful Book (on our library shelf) or watch Playschool. The Crayola website (www.crayola.com) has ideas as well.
Remember the cost of your activitiy can be reimbursed - just leave your receipt in an envelope addressed to the current Treasurer.
There are craft materials we have available in our storeroom. Please feel to use them. Just remember to write on the maintenance request list if you finish anything or there's not enough left for an activity. Donations or ideas for other materials are gratefully accepted
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